


Redefinition

by Infinity_formation



Category: Durarara!!
Genre: Akabayashi makes everything better, Angst, Crime, Depression, Feels, Hope, Izaya does not generally pick good role models, Izaya does not understand normal human norms and behavior, Izaya wants Shiki to go mind his own business so he can punish himself some more, Izaya’s long run on thoughts for spacing sorry, Loss of Control, More Feels, Pettiness, Regret, Self-Worth Issues, Shiki just wants this boy stabilized already, Shinra is not a good role model for depressed Izaya, Time Travel, Undercover, Yakuza, except for Kine, feelings of powerlessness, feelings reveled in dreams, have I mentioned feels?, lots of sass, not suicidal Izaya but thoughts that look like they are, parental Shiki and Akabayashi, path to recovery story, realistic descriptions of depression feels, self punishment, thank god for Akabayashi and his surprising parenting skills
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-16
Updated: 2019-02-09
Packaged: 2019-07-13 00:48:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16006787
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Infinity_formation/pseuds/Infinity_formation
Summary: After members of the cast find themselves back in time, Shiki, Akabayashi, and Kine have an intense plotting session where they realize there is a baby Orihara Izaya wandering around Tokyo with no ties to any organizations, no one watching him, no protection, still legally a minor, with two small sisters preventing him from disappearing into thin air. They do the natural correct moral thing of kidnapping him and threatening to adopt him.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I am so tired but so glad to finally be posting this. There's gonna be a lot of tags revolving around depression in this story, each chapter will have a list of tags at the start and a summary at the end if you want to skip that chapter and keep on going. 
> 
> Chapter 1 tags: depression, self worth issues, self deprecating thoughts, parents not around, taking care of young siblings, lack of energy, threats of adoption, kidnapping?, blackmail.

It’s cold out when he finally returns home at 2am on a Tuesday night. He shivers once as he stands in front of his door searching for his keys, careful not to make too much noise. Finally finding them he turns the lock as quietly as he can (pointless, he purposely rusted all the outer locks himself the first week) but he can’t help but hope every time he does it that this time he can make it in with minimal noise. He gets to the third lock before that horrible SCREECH sound resonates through the night. He sighs but continues opening the door and letting himself in before putting all the locks into place and leaning against the door to wait until he hears the sounds of the car driving around the block and out of the neighborhood. When it finally fades away he pushes the table that had previously been sitting next to the door appearing to be awaiting keys and newspapers to it’s proper position for the night in front of the front door where it will at least slow down any attempted break in. It’s covered in bright breakable knickknacks that will make ungodly amounts of noise and shatter into millions of glass and ceramic pieces all over the floor (and any intruders he can hope) if the door gets pushed in. 

House secured, he finally hangs up his coat (still not his favorite) and listens to see if he’s woken up the twins. Thankfully, after a full minute and no restless sounds, he decides they must still be asleep and moves into the kitchen to prepare food for the next day. He started to do it earlier when he first got home from school but noooooooo someone had more important uses for his time than making sure his family was fed and in bed on time. If he had been paranoid before, his current levels of precautions would be sure to turn some heads (if, of course, there was anyone to bother looki-) and would hopefully prevent him from making any future mistakes of this nature. . . (Who was he kidding he was so doomed.) 

Izaya did not use to spend his nights making a week or more’s worth of food for him and his sisters in advance in case he didn’t come home; he didn’t used to call in sick to school to fortify his home with an array of spare kitchen cutlery, odd easily improvisable knickknacks, and oddly placed furniture; he didn’t used to make late night runs unless there was a real emergency and he received due compensation. But then, Izaya always had been more curious than he knew was good for him, and now it’d finally blown up in his face, quite literally. 

Izaya was 26, but he was also 28, and had just turned 13. 

His problem had really started when one of his more occult focused clients had found an old artifact and had left it with him after requesting he find it’s origin. Never one to turn down an invitation to scour though various mythology he hadn’t (yet) thought anything of the man leaving the item behind for reference. It wasn’t until a week later when the thing started glowing that he realized he may have made a Very Big Mistake but by that point there was nothing left to do but flow with it. 

He’d woken up 11 years old again, just finishing up his last year of elementary school and newly saddled with year old twins. 

Checking the calendars had revealed he’d just missed his parents by a few months, winch was honestly probably a good thing he had no idea if he’d be up to acting like his childhood self immediately upon arrival, and checking the house had revealed he still had more than enough supplies to deal with the newly pintsized (was it really newly if he’d moved back in time?) pintsized twins and feed himself. So not a total disaster. 

He’d taken it slow after the first two days of running through any possibility of this happening on purpose and doing everything he could to check that this was real and he wasn’t being drugged and held somewhere. While he still couldn’t rule that out completely, all evidence, and more importantly his gut instinct, pointed to this being real. So he’d thought he had time to get back into the schedule of going to school, taking care of his sisters, reorienting himself to the times and expectations, crying over the lack of easy access to phones and computers, and generally trying not to stand out too much. It had all been going reasonably well until halfway through his third month here. 

He’d been walking home from school when he’d taken a slightly different route home. There was nothing unusual about this; he’d been doing it off and on to find the quickest way home from school before his sisters woke up from their nap or found their way out of their room (they were smart little things even at this age) and it also helped him refamiliarize himself with the neighborhood. He’d had to keep count of time in his head without his phone and so hadn’t noticed to sounds of the car driving up and had only heard the footsteps behind him when they were about a yard away, far to late to prepare himself to run or have much of a reaction at all besides a child’s panic. The man had scooped him up, kept his gloved hand over his mouth and quickly deposited him in the back of the car with the darkened windows before slamming the door. 

His first instinct had been to desperately try to open the door before a voice had grabbed his attention. 

“Izaya” 

He’d turned around to come face to face with a younger, but unmistakable Shiki. 

“Shiki-san ?” 

Apparently whatever force had sent him flying back through time hadn’t only effected him. Shiki, Akabayashi, and Kine had all come back as well and sometime during the intense plotting session that he was sure had occurred after their discovery, and not as Shiki had stated as they “just happened to decide,” they had realized that there was a baby Orihara Izaya wandering around Tokyo with no ties to any organizations, no one watching him, no protection, still legally a minor, with two small sisters preventing him from disappearing into thin air. 

A bit of digging on their part had revealed his parent’s plane tickets out of the country with no return flight booked, their normal residences abroad, and a solid pattern of Izaya’s parents never being around to attend even his mandatory school meetings. With or without his memories they weren’t willing to leave him alone in case some rival might take advantage of him before they could and gain his loyalty and had gone so far as to offer adoption. 

He’d quickly turned them down but hadn’t gotten out of the “meeting” without agreeing to their unofficial “guardianship” and doing whatever jobs were in his current ability in return for him living independently with his sisters and not being turned in to child services where he’d be adopted anyway and then really be screwed as their legal dependent. And his sisters… So for now he was momentarily stuck with them. It wasn’t their tactics, or the initial abduction or even the threats that really bothered him- if he was in their position he would have done the exact same thing- it was how much he hated anyone having power over him. But for now he’d have to deal with it and just be as much of a little devil as he could to them. 

Well, whatever. As much as he would deny it in front of anyone else his childhood body couldn’t take the same strain as his adult one. He’d been lost in thought as he prepared food but that last knife cut had almost grazed him. He dumped his share into the little bento he brought to school with him everyday and carefully prepared the little bowls of apple sauce and baby food for the twins. It was all he could do to bring himself to his bed and crawl under the covers before he passed out.

 

“WWHHAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHHAAAAAAA” 

Uggggg, no. Why couldn’t they change themselves? 

“WWWWWWWAAAAAAAAAA” 

God they weren’t stopping. Fine, fine! He slowly pushed himself up out of bed and wandered over to his sisters room, only banging into two walls on the way. 

“Ok you little tyrants, who- ayyyah – who decided Iza-nii doesn’t get any sleep tonight?” 

He picked them up one at a time. Mairu apparently, he knew she had it out for him. By the time he’d changed her and they’d both stopped crying it was already 6:30am and too late for him to go back to sleep. He moved them to their little cots in their play area, checked the blinds to make sure no light would wake them up, left their food he’d prepared last night and went back to his room to get his bag. He changed into a clean uniform and washed up, got his stuff, repositioned the furniture, went back for the lunch he’d almost forgotten, and finally put all the locks back in place as he left the house. 

The walk to his middle school wasn’t that long- he’d be there early with about half an hour before school started but that suited him just fine. Maybe he’d be able to get some sleep before class started. His first time through school he’d at least put in an effort to turn in his assignments on time if only for something to do and while he’d originally started with the same behavior after his arrival into the past, these late nights with Shiki’s men and the weight of being stuck in this situation was starting to get to him. He wasn’t sure if it was due to that or random chance but there had already been differences between his first time and this one. While he was still attending the same middle school he was in a different class without anyone he’d really known from the first time (he knew them, even then he’d made it a priority to know of everybody) but he hadn’t run into anybody like Nakura or… Shinra. 

He played with the piece of string he kept in his pocket. What he wouldn’t give to have his trusted knife back. He let himself walk the rest of the way in a daze as he pulled and bent the string between his fingers not thinking of anything. If one of Shiki’s rivals was to pull up and abduct him now, well, it would serve Shiki right for keeping him out for so long. However he still made it to school with no incident and after making his way to his classroom made a bee line to his seat before laying his arms and head on the desk and going back to sleep. 

 

“Ori-ha-ra-kun~” 

God no, why, what had he done to deserve this? Well, his mind was quick to remind him, there was that one time when- Why couldn’t he ask rhetorical questions in his own mind like a normal person? 

“Orihara-kun~~ wake up wake up!” 

Who ever had seen fit to end his nap had started poking him in the shoulder with what felt like a pen. He shot his hand up and grabbed it before slowly opening his eyes to see what nuisance he’d be cursing the rest of the day only to find- 

“Ah! You’re finally awake! You look tired. Have you not been getting enough sleep?” 

No. There was no way. They weren’t in the same class, he hadn’t even seen him since he’d got back. There was no reason for him to remember or even know of him (but Shiki and the others knew about you. They remembered) But no, just no. It couldn’t be, it COULDN’T (I’m not ready to deal with this) 

“Orihara-kun? You ok? Helloo~” 

It was Shinra. Looking exactly like he had when he’d first met him in middle school and waving a hand in front of his face. He didn’t have time to be spacing out. 

“How did you know my name?” He scowled and brushed the hand away. 

“Hmmm? Well Orihara-kun is Orihara-kun? What’s wrong? Do you not remember me?” 

(Yes, there was no way he could forget Shinra.) “I’ve never seen you before in my life.” 

“Hmmmmm Is that so.” He was leaning into his face now. He wished he would stop. “Well! That’s too bad. But since I do know you I’m gonna be spending time with you from now on.” 

He proceeded to pull up the chair from the next desk to Izaya’s and continued to his growing horror. 

“You see, I’ve had these memories of you from our time in this school for a few years now- like some big expanse of Déjà Vu maybe?- and I’ve really been looking forward to meeting you! But I guess it was too much to hope that you’d have the same memories too. Maybe I’ve got espa or something? Oooooo~ Then I could go on supernatural adventures with my beloved Celty just like in a manga! Oh, you don’t know about Celty yet do you? She’s-“ 

Gods above he had forgotten how bad Shinra was when he was younger. How long would he have to listen to this? Would Shinra keep a running tally of what he told him to check against what he said later to see if he slipped up and revealed that he did have his memories? That was just the sort of thing that he would do. He’d have to think of this Shinra and Celty like completely different people for now, that was the only way he could pull this off until he devised a better plan. 

“-and she’s so pretty! Why, just the other day she-“ 

What time was it? How long was he expected to sit here and listen to him prattle on? It couldn’t be that long before class could it? The clock on the wall told him there was still just under 20 minutes until class. If he listened he could hear people moving around and talking outside. 

“Listen, I- it’s great that you want to talk to me and all-“ (it really wasn’t) “-but I need to finish my homework for the next period. So if you’ll excuse me.” And he began taking out said homework he hadn’t been planning on finishing until lunch period.

“Eh?” 

That’s right. Shinra had never seen him be late on anything before in his life. Maybe this would throw him off. 

“That’s no good, you should do these things earlier. I know! Why don’t we do homework together from now on! We’re in different classes so we’ll be able to incorporate information from both of the teachers and get extra points!” 

This was karma. It must be. There was no winning. “No thanks, I’m good.” 

“You sure?” 

“Yes. Could you please leave me alone? I need to focus.” 

“Hmmmm. Well alright then. But I’ll come find you at lunch!” 

“Could you not-“ 

“Bye bye Orihara-kun! See you soon~” And he was gone. 

Izaya just sat there for a minute, brain still processing the disaster this was sure to turn into. His classmates started to file in. No one talked to him. No one looked at him. No one even moved within a foot radius of him. That’s how it always was. 

But Shinra, Shinra was also as he always was he guessed: poked right into Izaya’s bubble with no regard for what he was doing or his own life then ran off as he pleased and rarely was there when Izaya actually needed him. (He shouldn’t think that way about him. Shinra was always there if it was really important. And he’d be there more often if Izaya himself wasn’t such scum of the earth and didn’t keep giving in to his impulses and taking out the frustration he’d caused for himself out on Shinra and his friends out of jealously. Really he was insanely lucky that Shinra had ever bothered to put up with him at all.) Ah. And there was the pain again. There was no point in letting the truth hurt him like this again; he’d gone over this already. He stared at his homework unmoving until the bell sounded and he had to hurriedly put it away in his desk. 

By the time lunch came around he had a plan. Not his best plan but decent enough for a few hours sleep and Shinra getting the jump on him. As the rest of his classmates went out with their lunches or started eating in the classroom he made his way over to the window. He was lucky they were on the first floor, that way he could hop out and hide in the bushes or something until lunch was over and he could “Hey~ Found you~” 

He fell the rest of the way out the window and barely had time to catch his fall. 

“That’s surprising. How did you know I’d be waiting for you out here? Hehehe I guess those memories really were accurate about you.” 

Well that solidified it. This was Shinra. Shinra or his creepy middle school equivalent with all his memories of him. 

He was dragged to one of the benches under the nearby trees and had to listen to Shinra go on and on about various subjects for awhile before he finally brought up what he’d been worried about. 

“It’s weird though. That I’d have memories of you but not the other way around. Even Celty remembers you.”

Really? “She does?” 

“Yeah. We’d been hoping you might have some idea what was going on since, you know,… or I guess you wouldn’t know.” 

“Nope, sorry to dash your hopes and dreams.” 

“It’s ok it’s ok! I’m just glad I’ve finally found you. I expected us to be in the same class but somehow you ended up in the one below me.” He gave him a worried look. “Have you been having trouble keeping up with your school work?” 

Oh. Well, that explained it then. The school must group them into classes by their scores. He had started falling a little behind the year before when he’d lost most of his free time. 

“I’m doing alright, just tired today.” He waved him off. It was mostly true: even with his assignments coming in late or missing he was still doing well on his tests if not even better than the first time around. He just didn’t have the same time or motivation to finish his assignments like he use to. 

“Something must have changed for you then. The Orihara I knew always had top scores in school. Maybe it’s the same thing that’s preventing you from remembering.” 

“Hmm” He made a noncommittal noise and chewed on some rice as he thought it over. His memory was fine, but Shinra was right that there was something preventing him from “remembering”.

“What’s your name anyway? If you’re going to keep pestering me you should at least tell me your name. You seem to know mine already.” 

“Nope! I want to wait till you remember it on your own! That’ll be much more special. So please, don’t go asking around?” 

He gave a long sigh. He could never deny Shinra. “Fine, fine glasses-boy.” 

“Hey~ that’s no fair! Why do I gotta be glasses? Why not-” maybe this wasn’t so bad. 

Maybe he could allow for this, just this little bit of comfort here where he was still pretending life was normal.

He said goodbye to Shinra at the school gates and headed off towards the center of town just in case Shinra got any ideas about following him and he had to lose him. 

Thankfully ten minutes in and a few odd turns down back streets and there was still no sign of him. 

Sorry Shinra, but you should know that I’d protect you from getting involved in this, even if you are a shitty friend sometimes.   
He didn’t think Shiki or his group had any interest in Shinra but he wasn’t going to tempt fate anymore than he had to already by getting any of the few people that he actually cared about involved with him. When he finally turned 20 again and could live on his own he’d negotiate with Shiki and the others to get his freedom back. Then he could go back to Shinra if he hadn’t ditched him by then and apologize. 

Feeling better with this in mind he was turning the corner when there was suddenly a giant crash right ahead of him. NO. NO NO NO NO NO NO. Before the dust could settle he wipped back around the corner and pressed himself into the shadows, quieting his breathing. The sounds of destruction and painfully familiar yelling continued for a few minutes before he heard the sound of footsteps stomping off accompanied by grumbling that was getting father away. When the sounds were finally gone he let himself fall to the ground and breathe for a few minutes. 

Shinra was a big enough change to his life. He couldn’t handle the other right now. Not for a long time. Preferably not until long after he’d untangled himself. Maybe never. Maybe he’d just watch and never touch him this time, now that he knew he could never get close. But… what if he remembered too?


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Regular update schedule? What is that? Sorry for the long wait guys and thank you for your patience. Still not sure what updates will look like but I hope it'll be faster than this last one. 
> 
> Potential triggers for chapter 2:  
> self put downs/ self worth issues  
> depressive thoughts  
> Shinra  
> Thoughts that look suicidal (they are not)
> 
> If you want to avoid these and read the chapter the main thing to avoid is Izaya's long thought paragraphs. And just Shinra when he's alone with Izaya. If you want to avoid all hints of the last one skip the first half page of dialogue in the second scene as well.

Shiki was looking through some new papers outlining the parameters of a section of the market he was considering vying for when his office phone went off. “Shiki speaking”

“The brat’s sulking again.”

Akabayashi

Shiki sighed as he looked over his papers.

“Any reason this particular bout was brought to my attention?”

“I don’t think we can keep ignoring it for much longer.”

Shiki put his papers down. Obviously this was going to be more than just listening to Akabayashi wine about babysitting duty.

“I suppose it was only a matter of time. He has lost most of his coping mechanisms.”  
He leaned back into his seat. “So? What do you suggest we do?”

Akabayashi released a frustrated sigh. “I’m no therapist but the kid probably shouldn’t be left on his own so often. Maybe have him take his little nest over to Kine’s place when he gets out of school and keep him busy till curfew.”

“Somehow I don’t think he’ll like this very much. Have you talked it over with Kine yet?”

“Yeah, he’s all good. I think he likes babying him.”

“He might need to. It’s unclear at this point how much of an influence his adult mind is having on him right now. None of us knew of him when he was originally this age. Is this what he was like as a child? Is it in response to the circumstance and our actions? Or is this his real self that he’s kept hidden all this time?”

Akabayashi made an agitated noise on the other end of the phone. “Wasn’t exactly the picture of stability to begin with.”

They both took a moment to inwardly groan at the mess that was Izaya’s emotional health.

“I’ll drop by the next time I have time to check up on him.”

He heard Akabayashi chuckle on the other end. “I’m sure he’ll love that.”

Shiki grunted before shifting the topic. “And? How are your Koi fish doing?”

There was some shuffling on the other end that Shiki took to be Akabayashi fidgeting stressfully. “The blasted raccoons keep coming around whenever I’m out of the house.”

“Really? Still?”

“Right? It’s really aggravating. I’m still trying to think of what to do to get rid of them.”

“Hm. Be sure to keep me posted.” He glanced around the office. He wasn’t in a position yet where he could speak openly or help Akabayashi with this problem. Taking interest in a brat with potential was one thing, being in such close contact  
with someone like Akabayashi was quite another.

 

\---------------------------------------

“You want me to what?” Unsurprisingly Izaya did _not_ like this idea.

“It’d only be for the weekdays. You can think of it as an internship.”

“Uh-hn”

“It may even help you get your network back together. I understand you’re not happy with this decision but I felt it was necessary to prevent you from losing your capital.”

“And tell me Shiki-san, what ever have I done to inspire such confidence in you?”  
The vengeful sweetness dripped off his words. Shiki turned to look him straight in the eye.

“Get your head together if you don’t like it. You’re no good to either of us if you self-destruct.”

Izaya bristled. After a moment of silence he spoke again. “Maybe I was damaged beyond use. Sorry you’re just finding out now Shiki-san. I’ll contact the local temple and see if they take returns.”

If the brat was an adult right now Shiki might have allowed himself to slap him. Instead he took a long drag on his cigarette and prayed for patience.

“I would not have thought you’d want us following you anymore than we had to.” He could see Izaya try to suppress the flinch that followed but was unsuccessful. Another point for his younger body unable to follow his adult mind perhaps? “But to your point I do know exactly what happened to you. I didn’t even need to ask Kine. There were plenty of hospital staff and noisy neighbors to get a full report without disturbing you.”

Izaya started to sink into the car seat as if trying to escape from Shiki’s lecture.

“If anything, I’d say your condition has gotten worse since our unexpected return here.”

Izaya was definitely hunching in on himself now. Whatever acting skills he’d developed in life appeared to have largely gone out the window with their return to the past.

“If you can’t behave as more than a kid I’ll have to treat you like one until you can.”

“Shiki-“

“That’s final Izaya-kun. You’re not in your right mental state right now. I’ll be happy to reinstate your normal independence once you grow out of this but I’m not risking finding you dead somewhere, taken by a local gang you pissed off, or otherwise falling in on yourself because you’re currently unable to take care of yourself.”

Izaya swallowed his outrage and once he’d calmed himself if not stop shaking said “Shiki-san sure takes good care of his investments.”

“I wouldn’t have to if they’d stop looking for metaphorical power sockets to electrocute themselves with.” Izaya grunted with perhaps a bit of acknowledgement for this claim.

Shiki exhaled the smoke from the cigarette. “You know, no matter how you count it you’re still little more than a brat. Maybe if you’re willing to be a little human with Kine I’ll ease up on the restraints.”

At Izaya’s confused look “It’ll be good for you and I won’t have to worry as much if you get some closure where you can.”

Izaya looked back at the floor and stayed silent.

“Well think it over for awhile.”

They sat in silence for the rest of the ride. It was a weekend and Shiki had picked him up to go over a relationship web of some of their rivals within the Awakusu for his future plans. Without his networks a lot of his work these days was consulting and brainstorming with his handlers or being forced to sit through one of them trying to get him to learn something. Not all of these skills were useless, in fact a few of them he would have been eager to learn on his own, but the principle of the matter had stood strong and demanded he face them as unimpressed as any real preteen would be if they’d been told they needed to learn tricks to impress the adults. So. But with this new development maybe it would be better to put some degree of effort into the things Kine gave him at least. He liked Kine. Plus he did like the idea of someone he could trust being there to help him to look after his sisters at their current age. Kine had already officially left the Awakusu by the time they’d found him (and there was something going on with Akabayashi too given he was never at official locations and Shiki always had him refer to him as Red but he hadn’t had the energy or connections to investigate it as thoroughly as he’d like to) and was in general much more considerate in allowing Izaya to feel like he had some degree of control in his situation. Kine had been there with him before this whole “escapade into the past” thing had happened. And he knew he wouldn’t have to think on it much before being ok with Kine adopting him if it wasn’t for his sisters (Shiki though, that’d be a nightmare, and that was probably what they’d have planned to follow through on).

Shiki saw him off with an “I’ll see you on Monday” and so it was with a renewed anger towards the powers that be that Izaya came home to his two little sisters.

“Iza-nii!” The first one ran into him.

“Iza-nii!”

“Hello you two. Were you good while Iza-nii was out at work?”

“Yeah yeah!! Kuru and I made tree!”

“Its pretty.”

“Come see come see!”

The twins dragged him off to their play area where they had drawn several different versions of a “tree” the one they were showing him was put together with multiple pieces of paper and took up a few feet of space.

“This is really pretty girls. How about we put this up somewhere?”

“YAY!!!”

“And then Iza-nii is going to take a nap.” Thankfully the little pixies were too busy cheering to hear his last remark under his breath and by the time he’d taped the big and colorful tree over some papers their parents had left on the wall by the refrigerator the twins had decided they were hungry. It was simple enough to pull out the little lunches he’d made in the morning, plunk the girls back in the play area with their lunches and sneak off to his room while they debated whether pasta was better put to use in their stomachs or all over their coloring paper. Maybe the strain of his younger body was affecting him somehow. He’d almost like to think that as it implied this level of exhaustion would get better in a few years but he knew there was more to it than that.

(In his dream he dreamed that he was sitting and laughing with his schoolmates, when he got home his sisters were in middle school again and happy to see him, and when he got on his computer in the evening for work there was an email from Shiki praising him for a good job on his recent case. When he woke up he wiped away the tears that tried to form from the memory and promptly banished it to where he kept all the other lost dreams.)

\----------------------------------------

Monday came whether he wanted it to or not and he found himself running into Shinra a few blocks from the school.

“Ah! Orihara-kun. Did you have a good weekend?”

“Good enough, and you?”

“Great! I went through a few of my dad’s journals to check the current medical advancements. So much has changed in the sixteen – no it’d be thirteen years now from when I’m from.”

What? Sixteen? “Really?” Dang his inflection was off. “Has the medical world changed so much?”

“It has. Why –“ and there went the medical jargon again.

It had been almost a week now since he’d met Shinra again and thankfully he’d been content with them hanging out with each other during school and hadn’t pressed the subject of his memories again, though he did talk about the time difference often. Izaya supposed that if Shinra was living the same sort of life again that he had last time there wouldn’t be a lot of distractions to keep him busy. That could turn into a problem. A bored Shinra was a calculating Shinra and even Shinra’s most innocent of plots could easily cause Izaya harm in some fashion. He knew Shiki liked to complain on occasion that he was a child who had a bad tendency to play with dangerous games but much of his technique had been learned from Shinra. Shinra was better at it than him though (of course) where Shinra could mock and belittle people and everyone would laugh it off, when Izaya adapted it for his own use he was called a monster. If Shinra pointed out someone’s flaws people would think and maybe even learn from it but when Izaya had first tried the same thing he’d made people run away from home, join gangs, and that one case where someone had gone on a murder spree. He’d eventually accepted the fact that he just wasn’t talented in the same way as Shinra but that he could use this to his benefit anyway. He had worked to prefect his technique in highschool and it had served him well in his profession but he could never do what Shinra did. (He could never make people want to stay) And he didn’t understand why Shinra’s fuller, more complete technique brought him friends and praise while Izaya’s had such the opposite reaction that it would make people who hadn’t even known him call him scum and make strangers and acquaintances alike want to attack him. Maybe humans just didn’t like to see things incomplete? Perhaps it frustrated their brains to see an incomplete work or an art that had failed to meet it potential value? Yes, that made sense, that must be it.

Regardless, if Shinra got bored then Izaya might end up being the one to walk home with a spear through his heart, then Shiki would likely get word of him sulking and make his life even more of a mess. What was next, really? Therapy?

“You’re not listening at all are you?”

“Eh?!”

Shinra had stopped walking and moved in front of him. “It’s not nice to ask someone a question and then ignore their answer Izaya.”

He felt really bad. He should have been more carful about spacing out around Shinra. “Sorry.”

Shinra perked right up with his apology. “It’s all right. So long as you are sorry right?”

Izaya quickly nodded.

“Then it’s fine. Just don’t do it again ok? People won’t like you if you’re disrespectful and space out on them like that. And you’ve got enough problems getting people to like you anyway.”

He knew. He was horrible. Why did Shinra even bother finding him a second time? Oh right, cause he was bored and he’d been initially hoping Izaya could provide him with some answers. If Shinra was the one asking him for answers- asking him for help – he should drop his act and tell him right? But he couldn’t. Because Shinra’s safety was more important than confirming that he knew nothing.

Either way now that Shinra had found him and Izaya _didn’t_ have any information that would fix this mess Izaya was merely a way to relieve Shinra’s boredom as he was forced to go through school a second time. A tool. But that was ok, that was half of who he was anyway, and Shiki kept getting in the way of him fulfilling his duty to his other responsibility; so he’d be a tool for now. It would be easier to help Kururi and Mairu like that anyway. In fact that lined up pretty perfectly. By the time he was twenty they would be ten years and then he’d only have to wait five more years before they were fifteen and basically self sufficient even by normal standards. That left him five years to play nice on his own and get Shiki to lower his guard before it would be safe for him to fulfill his duty. He could deal with five years, probably.

He thought all this as Shinra chirped at him that he was forgiven and started dragging him into the school.

…And really, he was fine being that for Shinra. Shinra wouldn’t leave him alone despite knowing how despicable he was. Shinra who’s closest friends were monsters despite being the only one of them to be able to get humans to lik- (no don’t go that way) –Shinra who hadn’t left him to vanish into the dust and kept putting him back together. So he’d be what Shinra needed.

 

Throughout school he was a little more aware of his classes than normal. He put it down to trying to distract himself from what was happening later that day. He took his notes, answered questions, and behaved when Shinra came to grab him for lunch. By the time school was out he would have been amazed at how engaged he’d been if his mind wasn’t constantly bringing up what he’d be doing as soon as he got home. He’d managed to put it out of his mind as he walked with Shinra to the gate but when he got there he found a surprise waiting at the entrance.

“Brat!”

Before he could fully turn around he found himself caught in a strong hold as the person affectingly messed with his hair. “Look at you, already in middle school. The next thing you know you’ll be going through puberty. Ah~ I can see it now: ‘no, I don’t WANT TO’, ‘you’re not the boss of me’, ‘you’re not my real dad.’ The brooding, the rebellion! And then you’ll try running away from home with your first love and send the whole city into an uproar. Ah, to be young again.” He made sure to pitch his voice higher in his mimicry of Izaya’s prepubescent voice.

“Ah, but isn’t Orihara-kun already like that?” Shinra apparently felt the need to butt in as Izaya tried futilely to remove the near death grip around his shoulders.

“Hmm? So he is! They grow up so fast! Hahaha!”

“Aka-Akabayashi-san!”

Akabayashi chuckled good naturedly before loosening his grip to something easier to breath in.

“I see you’ve made a friend. That’s good. What’s your name kid?”

“Glasses-boy!”

Despite Akabayashi obviously taking the effort to dress in regular casual clothes and no longer carrying the intimidating scar across his eye or the cane he still gave off an underlying feeling that he wasn’t one to cross. Or at least Izaya thought so. Most of the students around them seemed to have totally fallen for the goofy uncle image he was pulling. Whether Shinra was doing the same or just screwing with him couldn’t be determined.

“Hahaha! Very funny. Well Glasses-kun, thank you for watching out for Izaya here, he tends to get his way into trouble a little too easily.”

“Ah, no, it was nothing. Orihara is a good friend.”

Izaya could feel himself tensing in anger and had to stop himself from showing it on his face. How dare they talk over him like this as if he was the little kid here being passed between adults. “Hey. I’m right here you know.”

“Ah, so you are.” Akabayashi finally let go of him and he felt the need to shake out his limbs a bit to make sure he still had full circulation in all of them.

“It was nice meeting you Glasses-kun but I’m afraid we have to go now.”

“Ah, yeah. I’ll see you tomorrow sh-.” He quickly caught himself and disguised the small exhale of breath that had been forming into Shinra’s name as a sneeze.

“Careful Orihara-kun, don’t get sick now. It’s still only the beginning of the year. I’ll bring some supplements with me tomorrow~” And he skipped off in the opposite direction.

 

They waited a few beats until he had rounded the corner. “That was… ah who was it?”

“Humph, no one important. Just a delusional kid who thinks he wants to be friends.” Izaya said as he turned around to start walking home.

“Hmmm?” Akabayashi hummed as he turned to walk next to him. “Having friends is a good thing you know. You’re only thirteen, you should enjoy your youth. I’ll get you some time so you can go visit and spend some time with him after school.”

“Wha? What?”

“Go to the shopping district, walk around town, play some video games. Kine can babysit your sisters once they get used to him. Come on” he turned his crazy grin on him “it’ll be fun. I can’t imagine you’ve had any fun for three or more years now.”

They walked in silence for a few paces. When they were far enough away from anyone passing by to not worry about anyone overhearing Akabayashi spoke again. “You know, business aside Shiki and I really do want you to be ok.”

Izaya looked up at him.

“There’s no disguising that you’ve got clinical depression at this point, and it’s probably our fault, but we do care about you as a person and hope to see you through this.”

“…What?”

Akabayashi threw his arm around his head and pulled him close to mess with him again as they kept walking. “You heard me. You’re a brat, but you’re a lovable brat. Now come on we need to make a stop after we drop off your sisters.”

And so he was led off, confused, back to his home with the feeling that someone had just thrown a flash bomb in his head and a strange feeling forming in the middle of his chest.


End file.
